Yellow Cedar Arrow Shafts

ArcheryTalk Articles & Blogs » Stick Bows: See The Arrow!

By Joe Blake

http://www.bowandarrowhunting.com/

 At 27 yards the big pronghorn buck stood, legs splayed, as it quenched its thirst at the muddy pond.  The only problem from my perspective in the well-situated pit blind was that another smaller buck stood adjacent to the animal I was concentrating on and effectively prevented a shot.  All I could do was wait and hope that the smaller buck finished drinking and left before my target departed. 

 That’s exactly what happened!  One minute both bucks were noisily gulping down the dirty water and the next minute my buck stood alone as his counterpart turned to vacate the area.  Quickly coming to full draw, I concentrated on the trophy’s chest and released the heavy cedar arrow, but that’s when things became sketchy.  Sure, the Zwickey-tipped arrow ate up the distance in an instant and hit home with a resounding thud, but that was all I knew for sure.  You see, I had recently made up these arrows and used a black cock feather, two gray-barred hen feathers and a black nock…what could I have been thinking!

 Brighten the Way  One of the most important points to releasing an arrow at a big-game animal is to be able to follow its flight and identify the hit, and this is virtually impossible when using dark or drab-colored fletching and nocks.  This is especially true for instinctive bowhunters who must train their eyes to the flight of the arrow in order to learn to shoot well.  Obviously, if you can’t see what your arrow is doing on each and every shot you can never complete the learning process, and for this reason it is imperative that you use the arrows that you can see well in flight.

 From a personal standpoint, I have always preferred yellow fletching and nocks more than any other color, but white, red, orange, chartreuse and others might work for you as well or better.  Each bowhunter is different and has different preferences when it comes to arrow colors and combinations.  Also, some hunters can get by with just a bright cock feather or even simply a bright-colored nock and follow their arrow’s flight just fine, which is great if you are concerned that the game you are after might pick up a quiver full of brightly colored arrows.

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